“There was a little girl at the home where Graye lived after Crystal’s death. She and Graye were close, but the girl died in an accident just before she was due to leave the home.”
Nick looks up at her with tired eyes.
“She had a roommate in college, Natalie Ellis. Natalie died of an overdose. The two were close as well. And of course, there was Inez Jeffries. And David.”
Nick waits.
“I’ve been searching for the first domino, I suppose. The tipping point that turned Graye into the person she eventually became. It’s stupid, I guess. I spoke to Alex before I came here. She admitted she killed her mother, and you say the same. I just thought if I could get a clearer picture of what happened that night, if I could just understand, maybe I could begin to get Graye out of my head.”
Nick’s face has gone pale. He looks like nothing so much as a haunted man. He opens his mouth to speak, then shuts it again.
Laura’s pulse picks up speed. “What is it?” she asks.
He stands, paces like a caged animal. Finally, he stops and turns to face her.
“I hate to think about that night,” he says, his voice low and pleading. “I’ve worked so hard to lock it away.”
“Nick, please tell me,” Laura says. It’s not fair, she knows it’s not, but she asks all the same.
Nick runs his hands down his face, then holds them out in front of him, watching the way they tremble.
“She was sleeping,” he says when he speaks again. “Wearing one of those little masks I thought people only wore in movies. My heart was beating so hard I’m surprised it didn’t wake her up.”
Laura swallows back the lump that’s formed in her throat.
“Alex was flying, though. I’d never seen her eyes so bright, not even when she said she loved me. We tied her up in her own bedsheets. Alex put the tape over her mouth so the neighbors wouldn’t hear her scream.”
Wide-eyed, Laura listens to the echoes of a past long dead and buried, resurrected in Nick’s words. One night, the repercussions of which are still reverberating.
Too late, she almost wishes she could stop him. Just walk out the door and never return.
But this is what Laura has come for.
55
GRACE
There are noises coming from Mother’s room, so Grace clicks off the little flashlight she stole from the kitchen drawer to read under her covers at night. She doesn’t want to get in trouble again.
But the voice doesn’t sound like Mother’s. On soft feet, she steps out of bed and pads to her bedroom door.
“Come on, let’s get the cash and go,” she hears Nick say. She knows it’s him because she listens at her sister’s door when he comes to see her.
But he hasn’t been here in weeks. Mother was angry after last time, when she found Nick and Alex hugging in her room with the door shut. She told Alex she couldn’t see him anymore, which made Grace as sad as it made her sister angry.
She likes Nick. He’s nice to her.
Nicer than her sister.
“Wait,” Alex says. “I need to get something.”
Her voice is excited, happy, and Grace is glad. Since Mother made her break up with Nick, she’s been silent or shouting, with nothing in the middle.
She hears footsteps running down the hallway and wonders if Alex and Nick are playing a game. She hopes they don’t wake up Mother. She took one of her white pills before bed, but they’re being very loud.
“Alex, come on already. Let’s go,” Nick shouts. He doesn’t sound as excited as her sister, but maybe he’s sleepy. It is very late.
Grace slides from her bed and peeks around the corner of the door. Her sister will never let her join their game, but she’d like to see Nick again. He always smiles and asks her what’s up. He laughed the first time she looked up at the ceiling to see what he meant.
Grace had never made anyone laugh before, and it made a river of warmth run through her body.
Alex is coming back down the hallway, and she’s carrying something in her hands, but it’s dark and Grace can’t tell what it is. She ducks her head inside the door when Alex sees her and runs back to the bed.
“Alex, hurry up!” Nick shouts.
“My sister’s awake,” she shouts back.
“So what? Let’s get the money and go. She won’t say anything.”
“Gra-cie,” Alex says in a voice she only uses when she’s about to do something mean. “I saw you, Gracie. You can’t hide from me.”
Grace pulls herself tighter into a ball. Sometimes Alex can be even meaner than Mother.
The side of her bed dips down, and the covers are yanked out of her grasp.
“You don’t have to be afraid of me, Grace,” Alex says. She sounds sweet, like she means it, but Grace knows better than to believe her. “I’m going to fix everything. You’ll see.”
“Is Nick here?” Grace asks, her desire to see him outweighing her fear of her sister.
Alex laughs. “I think somebody has a little crush. Yeah, Nick is here. And we’ve got a plan. Do you want to know what it is?”
Grace nods. She’ll play along if it means she’ll have a chance to see Nick.
“Well, come on, lazy bones. Time’s a-wasting.”
Alex stands up and ushers Grace out of the bed and into the hallway.
“Jesus, Alex, what are you doing out there, baking a cake? Did you get the money or not?”
Grace stops and turns back to her sister, who’s walking too close behind her. “Why is Nick in Mother’s room?” she asks, her eyes gone wide. “Is she playing the game too?”
Alex doubles over and for the second time in her life, Grace realizes she’s made someone laugh.
Alex laughs so hard it makes Grace laugh too.
“Come on, already!” Nick shouts, and he doesn’t sound like anything is funny.
Alex wipes her eyes and shuffles Grace forward.
“Yeah, Gracie. Mother’s playing the game too. She’s the monkey in the middle.”
They round the corner together and step into the bedroom, but Grace is confused. She begins to get a bad feeling low down in her stomach.
Mother doesn’t look like she’s enjoying this game. Neither does Nick. He’s holding the bedsheets from Mother’s bed where they’ve been knotted around her, and there’s tape on her mouth, but Grace can still hear her muffled shrieking behind it.
Nick is practically sitting on top of her, trying to keep the sheets from coming undone, but Mother is struggling anyway. Her sleeping mask is sliding down her face.
“I don’t think she likes this game,” Grace whispers, and her sister laughs again.
“What the hell, Alex?” Nick yells. “Why’d you bring her in here?”
“Little sneak was peeking out her door,” Alex says with a shrug.
Grace can feel tears building up, but she doesn’t want to cry in front of Nick. He’s not happy to see her. Not even a little.
“Look, Grace,” Alex says. “We’ve got an early Christmas present, all wrapped up in a bow.”
Alex has done something bad. Something really, really bad.
She wants to run back to her room and hide under the covers again and pretend she didn’t see anything, but her sister has a hard grip on her shoulder and Grace is frozen in place.
Alex leans down behind her and whispers in her ear.
“Want to hear something funny, Gracie? When I was your age, I thought Mother loved me and hated you. And then when I got a little older, I thought she hated me and loved you. And then I realized she hates us both and the only person she’s ever loved is herself.”
Grace’s eyes go wide. What if Mother hears what she’s saying? She doesn’t think she does, because she’s making so much noise herself, but Grace knows one thing. They’re all going to be in so much trouble.
“Alex,” Nick says loudly. “We’ve got to go.”
“Just hold your damn horses,” Alex shouts back.
Grace doesn’t think that�
��s a very nice way to talk to Nick.
“Here’s the thing, Grace,” Alex says, her voice a whisper again. “I’m going to leave, and I’m not coming back here ever again. When I do, there’s not going to be anyone left here for Mother to hate except for you. I know we’ve never really gotten along, but for once in your life, Gracie, I’m going to do you a favor. I’m going to give you the chance to help yourself. Would you like that?”
Grace whips her head around to look Alex in the eyes. “Is Nick leaving with you?” she asks.
Alex nods slowly, her own eyes big like she’s making fun of her. She has a little smile on her face that Grace has learned means bad things.
“Can I come too, Alex?” Grace asks, giving voice to her deepest, most secret wish. “Please, Alex. I’ll be really quiet and good.”
Alex tilts her head and looks upward, like she’s thinking over her answer.
“Please, Alex. I’ll do anything,” Grace begs.
“Alex, we have to go!”
But her sister ignores him and stares into Grace’s eyes.
“Anything?” she asks, and Grace nods so fast and strong that her hair falls over her face.
“Alex!” Nick yells.
But Alex smiles and places something cold and heavy in Grace’s hands.
56
LAURA
Nick rubs his hands hard across his eyes.
“It happened so fast. I didn’t even know she had a gun, but then she put it in her little sister’s hands and I heard her words as clear as a bell. ‘All you have to do is point and squeeze the trigger.’”
And in Laura’s mind, the dominoes begin to fall.
“Grace didn’t even hesitate,” Nick says, the horror as fresh as if it had happened yesterday. “And I just sat there and watched it happen. I should have grabbed the gun. In my dreams, I grab for it, push it up toward the ceiling, and everyone walks away. But that’s not what happened. I sat there like the idiot kid I was, and it was over before I even realized what I was seeing.”
He stares at her, trying to make her understand this thing she’d so thoughtlessly sought to find.
“And Alex was laughing the entire time.”
Laura has a hand pressed to her mouth. She’d known. Somewhere inside, she’d known the truth was bigger and more terrifying than even she could imagine. But hearing it said aloud leaves nothing but the taste of regret in her mouth.
“Grace dropped the gun and turned back to her sister. ‘I’m ready now,’ she said. And she smiled. With blood and who knows what else running down her face, that poor, sad, messed-up kid smiled, and Alex just laughed.
“‘I’m not taking you anywhere, Gracie,’ she told her. ‘But don’t ever say I never gave you anything, sis. I just gave you the biggest gift of your life.’”
Laura’s face is wet with tears.
She came here. She asked for this. She wanted the truth, and now she’s got it.
“Alex was ready to go then, but I couldn’t go anywhere with her. She was the same monster her mother had been. Worse, because she’d turned Grace into a monster too. I tried to wipe Grace’s fingerprints off the gun. My hands were shaking, but I managed it by sheer chance. Later, they picked up a partial of mine and Alex’s as well, but no one ever knew Grace had held the gun.”
He stares out at the sky outside the window of his third-floor apartment, and Laura doesn’t envy him the images playing across his mind.
“I was the one who held her face between my hands and tried to wipe away the blood. I whispered in her ear, ‘Tell them it was Alex, Gracie. Say it was Alex, and I’ll back you up, but you can never, ever tell them what really happened.’
“I didn’t even know if she heard me. The light had gone out of her when Alex said she couldn’t go with us. She just sat there, right on the floor of her mother’s bedroom, and didn’t say a word.”
Nick opens the window again and breathes in the city air. He taps out another cigarette and lights it up.
“I heard the sirens then. The gunshot had woken a neighbor, who’d called the police. Alex was throwing things into her mother’s car when they arrived. She still thought we were going to get away with it.”
“Why didn’t Alex tell anyone?” Laura asks. “She blames Grace for her conviction, but she never said Grace was the one who pulled the trigger. Why not?”
Nick looks back out the window.
“Alex isn’t stupid. She knew no one would believe her. Not with me telling a different story, and then Grace, once she began to speak. God, I was so worried she’d lay it all out there and Alex would walk. It took weeks for her to open up. Therapists, hypnosis, you name it. But when she finally spoke, she did just what I’d told her to do. She pointed the finger at her sister.”
He dropped the second cigarette, only halfway smoked, into the jar of water and turned to face Laura directly.
“But more than that, Alex is proud of what she’s done. So to answer your question, Mrs. West, yes, Alex killed her mother that night. She just used Grace as her weapon of choice.”
His expression is weary, as if he’d like nothing more than for Laura to go now. And she knows she should. She should leave him to whatever peace he’s able to find, but she’s not sure her legs will carry her weight.
“There are many, many things I wish I’d done differently, Mrs. West,” Nick says. “I regret that I didn’t tell someone Grace was dangerous. That cost your husband his life. My only excuse for not exposing Grace is that I still remembered the face of that little girl, with blood on her cheeks and hope dying in her eyes.”
She looks up and meets his gaze.
“I was always afraid Alex and her mother had ruined that girl’s life. It turns out, I was right.”
57
LAURA
Laura is wandering aimlessly through the market in Rockaway, but she’s having trouble focusing on her list. She realizes she’s been pushing an empty cart for ten minutes without once glancing at the aisles. She sighs.
Being home, armed with the answers she’d sought, is supposed to allow her to put her demons to bed, but they’re more restless than ever.
The beach has lost its appeal. Her friends speak and she finds herself drifting off, her mind wandering to the stories she’s gathered that weigh heavy on her heart and mind.
“Like a car with one low tire, you drift.”
Only Milo remains a constant source of joy.
Laura has always been a doer. She gets antsy if she doesn’t have at least three big projects to juggle at a time. But her work isn’t as engaging as it once was.
She’s read the entirety of her unsolicited slush pile in the weeks since her return from Chicago, desperately searching for a voice with enough resonance to drown out Fiona Boyd’s, but it’s no use.
Her eyes are drawn to a mound of fresh dark cherries piled high in the produce section. She stops dead in the aisle and stares.
The glossy little fruits seem to wink in the light, and Laura’s mouth begins to water.
When was the last time she bit into a fresh, tart cherry? She can’t remember, but suddenly there’s nothing she wants more. She needs to feel the skin burst between her teeth and the red juice coat her tongue.
She picks one up, feels the lightness of it in her hand. She slowly brings it to her lips, tastes the smooth outer skin with the tip of her tongue.
“Mommy, that lady is eating the fruit! You said we couldn’t eat the fruit until we paid for it. Is she going to get in trouble?”
“Maybe her mommy never told her not to eat the fruit before you pay for it,” the woman across the aisle says, making no effort to keep her voice down. “But I’m your mommy so you have to listen to me.”
A small blush rises in Laura’s cheeks, but she refuses to be shamed by a stranger in the market.
Laura takes the cherry, unbitten, in her hand and drops it into a produce bag, then fills the rest of the bag full to bursting with more of the dark-red fruit, so dark they’re almost black.
“Is this all for you today?” the checker asks.
“Yes,” Laura says, uncaring of the list she’s left abandoned in her purse. “That’s all.”
That night, with her lips stained a deep red, Laura takes a pen and paper and writes a letter to a woman who is not her friend.
A woman who, under the most bizarre of circumstances, has somehow instead become her other half. The moon to her tide.
Her sister.
58
LAURA
After
“Who would you like me to make this out to?”
Cecelia Ainsley glances up, pen poised over her latest novel.
“Why, if it isn’t Laura West,” she says with a grin. “Look what the east wind has blown in.”
The intervening years have been kind to the author. She’s as coiffed and regal as she ever was.
“Congratulations, Ms. Ainsley,” Laura says with a smile of her own. “The novel is a work of art.”
Cecelia waves her hand. “Honey, at this point in my career it could be shite on a shingle and the publishers would still be kissing my rear.”
“And with good reason,” Laura agrees with a laugh. “I won’t take up your time.” She throws a backward glance at the line of fans waiting behind her for an autograph.
Cecelia bends her head to write in the book Laura has slid across the table. “Are you back in New York for good now?” she asks.
“Just a visit,” Laura says with a shake of her head.
“Why don’t you join me for dinner tonight, then? I’d love to catch up before I fly home to the wilds of Texas.”
She slides Laura’s copy of her book back to her.
Laura’s first instinct is to say no, couched in some polite excuse about a previous engagement, but she glances down and reads the hand-scrawled inscription Cecelia has left there.
For the woman who survived the forge, then learned to embrace her scars.
The Shadow Writer Page 29